Dangerous Attraction

by Melinda Cross

  His expressive lips tightened and folded inward for a moment, as if the prospect of saying more was almost unbearably distasteful. ‘Johnny had gone outside to bring something in from the plane—I can’t remember what—and Charity and I were in the living-room having drinks. She came right out with it. Johnny wasn’t her type at all, she said. She could see that now. But I was, and if I doubted that she would prove it to me right there in the living-room. For a minute I was so stunned I couldn’t do anything; I just stood there like a robot while…’ He closed his eyes briefly and winced. ‘Then something inside me snapped. I called her a name and pushed her away, hard enough to dump her on the floor. That’s when Johnny walked in.’

  Rebecca was staring at him, holding her breath, completely caught up in the story. The silence was so deep she could hear the muted gurgling of the distant river as it passed over its rocky bed. It was a strange, soothing water sound, totally unlike the powerful, hushed roar of the Pacific waves.

  ‘He’d left his gloves on the hall table, and heard Charity’s little speech when he came back for them,’ Marcus continued at last.

  Rebecca’s brows tipped in sympathy as she imagined Johnny Rivard standing alone in the hall, listening to the woman he loved betray him.

  If it happened, she reminded herself sharply, horrified to realize that she was accepting everything he said as gospel; that she was so anxious to believe Marcus was blameless, she’d already discarded Charity’s claims.

  Slow down, she commanded herself, taking a deep breath, straightening in her chair, steeling herself against the temptation to believe Marcus simply because…She closed her eyes briefly, refusing to consider her reasons.

  ‘And then what happened?’ she made herself ask brusquely.

  Marcus raised his glass to his lips and drank for the first time, deeply. His eyes were flat and fixed inward, on a day long past. ‘There was a scene. That was the first time Charity tried accusing me of being the seducer, but it didn’t fly then. Johnny had overheard everything.’ He turned to Rebecca with a pained smile. ‘He was the only witness in my defense.’

  Sadly, or conveniently, gone now, Rebecca thought, depending on whose story was true.

  ‘He was very…controlled. Very quiet. You’d have to know Johnny to realize how odd that was. Anyway, he just told her to get her bags for her last free ride on Johnny Rivard. That’s the way he put it. And that’s the one and only time Johnny and I ever argued. There was a weather front moving in, and I didn’t want him to fly, but he was convinced he could beat it. Besides, all he could think of was getting her out of there.’ He drank again, then set the glass very carefully down on the arm of the chair. His hand was trembling. ‘I shouldn’t have let him go,’ he finished quietly.

  Rebecca saw the guilt at last, a black weight bearing down on a man who staggered beneath the burden. But it was an oddly innocent guilt, an undeserved guilt, taken up not because he had caused Johnny to leave, but because he thought he should have done more to prevent it.

  She continued to watch his face for what seemed like a long time, until she felt the complaint of muscles that had been holding her too long in a posture of rigid attention. Gradually, by inches, she eased back into her chair and looked out over the field, feeling utterly drained.

  She waited patiently for a rising tide of skeptical questions to pop into her mind, for doubts to stutter across the placid emptiness of her thoughts—but it never happened.

  I believe him, she thought at last, a little stunned by the realization.

  It was an amazing occurrence, really, for Rebecca to believe anything without volumes of corroboration. Skepticism, after all, was the only defense against misplacing your trust in people destined to betray it. Her father had taught her that. ‘Nothing will change just because I’m getting married, honey. You’ll always be my best girl. And we’ll be such a happy family, you’ll see. Just trust me, honey,’ he’d told her. And yet here she was, that bitter lesson of her past notwithstanding, taking another man at his word, ignoring the fact that there was no proof, no witnesses, no irrefutable evidence—trusting a foolish heart that told her Marcus Flint was speaking the truth.

  There, a small voice uttered deep inside, the adult part of her soothing the child, quieting her fears, telling her it was all right to trust again. This time, it was safe.

  She surrendered to the voice, gave in to the warmth of a faith in humanity she had denied herself for so long. And, inside, she smiled just a little, realizing she didn’t simply believe Marcus; she believed in him. ‘And the rest of it?’ she asked almost absently.

  He lifted one shoulder, unaware of the extraordinary metamorphosis occurring in the woman next to him. ‘I suppose it was the way Charity described it in the book. We knew they’d gone down…we searched…I finally found what was left of the plane on the fourth day, but she was long gone by then, and we couldn’t find her. We didn’t even know she was still alive until the day they found her on the road, over a week later.’

  Rebecca caught herself leaning toward him again, and made herself pull back. ‘I didn’t realize you were the one who found the plane,’ she said, her voice gentle. ‘The book didn’t mention that.’

  Marcus gave no indication that he had even heard her.

  Rebecca reached over to push the ‘stop’ button on the recorder, and then the two of them sat on the porch, listening to the silence.

  Eventually Rebecca gathered her things and went into the house. Marcus blinked at the sound of the door clicking shut behind her, and brought his glass back up to his lips.

  CHAPTER SIX

  AS REBECCA climbed the stairs for the second time in as many hours, she wasn’t thinking specifically about the story Marcus had told her, or what she would do with the information; she wasn’t even thinking about what she would do as distantly as ten minutes from now. Her mind was blessedly clear and uncluttered, totally focused on the immediate.

  As she put the recorder and notepad back in her briefcase, she smiled a little at the oddity of it. This is what they call living for the moment, she mused, marveling at the incredible freedom of such a philosophy.

  It seemed that all her life she had been looking forward, waiting for something to happen. Waiting to be free from the subtle cruelties of her stepmother and stepsisters; waiting to move away from the laundry’s hard labor and seedy neighborhood; waiting for that prince of childhood fairy-tales who could banish her doubts and awaken her embittered, sleeping heart with a touch.

  Happiness, or at least contentment, had always resided somewhere down the road of time for Rebecca, and to find herself at that place at last was incredibly liberating. Trust in another human being—what she’d always thought of as the blind gift of fools—that had been the price of admission.

  She felt impossibly light, a happy balloon of a person buoyed by the knowledge that Marcus Flint was innocent; that the man who had finally moved her was not a villain, but a man of honor, a man worthy of Johnny Rivard’s trust…and hers. Try as she might, she could not keep that radiant thought from piercing the gloomy veneer of cynicism she had worn for so long.

  A giggle bubbled up from her throat unexpectedly, startling her. She pressed both hands to her mouth to stifle it, her eyes wide, then glanced over at the dresser mirror, half expecting to see someone else peering back at her, some strange woman subject to sudden, inexplicable fits of giggling.

  Her own reflection eyed her with brightly wary blue eyes, and she was just as surprised to find herself unchanged as she would have been to see a total stranger.

  I should look different, she thought, a little disappointed that the new feelings inside hadn’t manifested themselves in a visible transformation.

  She turned impatiently from the mirror so blind it couldn’t see into her heart, and clasped her hands under her chin, wondering what to do next. She had to stay here, of course. There was much more to learn if she was going to write a screenplay that would tell the real story behind Test of Courage, and exo
nerate Marcus. Surely it was the least she could do for an innocent man—a man as trapped now by circumstances as she had ever been.

  Oh, really, Rebecca? her own thoughts mocked her. Is that why you’re staying? Just to help Marcus? Or could your reasons be a little more selfish than that?

  She blushed instantly, as flustered as she would have been had someone else asked the question.

  All right, she admitted to herself. So maybe she wasn’t exactly devastated at the prospect of staying here alone with Marcus. And maybe proving his innocence was as motivated by emotion as it was by a sense of justice and fair play—so what? She couldn’t help it if she happened to like the man. She couldn’t help it if her heart seemed to hold its breath every time he looked at her a certain way, or touched her, or.

  She closed her eyes, her fingertips lightly touching the valley between her breasts, a gentle admonishment to a heart that wouldn’t keep still.

  Beneath her hand, her stomach growled audibly, bringing lofty fantasies immediately down to earth. It also reminded her that the body never wanted to wait for the mind to justify its physical needs.

  I have to be careful, she told herself in a mental whisper, struggling to remain motionless, to defy her body in this small matter of hunger as practise for the control she might need later.

  Her stomach growled again, louder this time, and she smiled helplessly, deciding she’d practised control quite long enough.

  I’m hungry, she thought, foolishly delighted with the concept. Marcus must be hungry, too.

  Just forming his name in her mind made her full lips curve upward, and if she had turned at that moment to look once again into the mirror she might have seen the transformation she had hoped for.

  Instead another laugh started to bubble upward, and she had to focus to suppress it. Having never experienced the spontaneous, irrepressible expressions of happiness, she was hopelessly inept at containing them in a somber situation.

  And this is a somber situation, she scolded herself sternly as she started back downstairs. A good man is dead, another good man is wounded, and an evil woman is capitalizing on both tragedies. Something has to be done about that. Later.

  First, she was going to make Marcus some lunch.

  Her step lightened by the unaccustomed weightlessness of an even lighter heart, she scampered downstairs and into the kitchen, the legs of her jeans whistling merrily, her tennis shoes squeaking on the glossy floors.

  It’s a lovely kitchen, she thought, gathering food from the refrigerator and stacking it happily on a nearby counter. Too big, of course, but so welldesigned, with only a few steps between work stations and a perfect place for everything.

  She found knives in a recessed holder in the chopping block, and marveled at that. Right where they should be, she thought, clucking her tongue at the scores of foolish designers who had never considered the supreme sense of such an arrangement.

  Her movements were quick and efficient as she lost herself in the soothing mindlessness of domestic chores. The bread knife made music slicing through a loaf; lettuce and tomatoes and carrots formed an artistic collage in a glass bowl. She smiled throughout this process of creation, humming under her breath, tomorrow a million miles away.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Marcus’s voice came from the doorway.

  Rebecca turned with a smile as radiant as she might have hoped to see in the dresser mirror earlier. Her smile faltered a little, worked its way down into a frown when she looked at him carefully. She felt her sense of carefree abandon seeping away and worried that it had been so dependent on the way this man looked at her.

  Tunnels were carved in the thick fabric of his hair, as if he’d run his fingers through it repeatedly. A jumble of black strands crossed his brow like angry scratches. A scowl had drawn parentheses around the sculpted mouth, and the gray eyes looked flat and empty.

  Rebecca searched them for signs of life. Hello? Is anybody in there? she asked silently. ‘You look dreadful,’ she said.

  One black brow arched in response.

  ‘What you need is food. I’m making lunch. Sit down. I’ll wait on you for a change.’

  He eyed the salad she was making, the cold cuts and bread already laid out on the counter. ‘Sorry. I should have known you’d want to eat before you leave.’

  Rebecca’s hands froze over the big wooden bowl where she was tossing a salad, vinaigrette dripping from the spoon to plop noisily into the green cup of a lettuce leaf. In the theater of her thoughts she laughed gaily and said, Leave, Marcus? What makes you think I’m going to leave? But in reality she just stood there, feeling that brand-new, fragile shell of happiness begin to checker and crack, like porcelain exposed to brittle cold.

  It wasn’t possible that he would want her to leave, was it? Surely he understood that everything was different now, everything had changed—Rebecca Hutchinson had opened her heart at last and all he had to do was walk in.

  ‘Have you made your plane reservations already, or would you like me to do that for you?’ His words slammed into her thoughts like a brick wall—so coolly spoken, so totally indifferent.

  She looked down at the salad, at slivers of julienned carrots poking tiny orange arms up through an ocean of green, like little drowning people.

  She was a child again, betrayed once more by a child’s optimistic faith that happiness would last.

  Her eyes fell closed and her heart twisted in her chest. Oh, Rebecca, she thought pathetically. They keep knocking you down, and you’re so damn thickheaded you just keep getting up so they can knock you down all over again. Just because he made a pass, you think he wants you around forever?

  But he touched me, a part of her mind insisted. He wanted me. He said something was happening between us…

  ‘Is there something wrong with the salad?’ his voice came from directly next to her left ear, making her jump and clutch her chest.

  The dripping spoon she still held sent dressing splattering across her white sweater and over her shoulder. It fell like oily raindrops on the gleaming tile floor.

  ‘Oh, dear,’ she said in a tiny voice, a crushed voice, twisting to look at the few drops on the floor. They looked gigantic, like messy, oily oceans she would never be able to clean up. She bit down on her lower lip, stifling a childish, totally unfamiliar urge to burst into tears.

  ‘I’ll take care of it.’ On hands and knees, a false cavalier in black, Marcus mopped up the drops with a paper towel and then stood to face her. ‘You didn’t answer me. About the airline reservations.’

  Rebecca felt the hopelessness pulling down at her mouth, her eyes, as if her face were melting into a featureless puddle. In a perverse way, the feeling was almost comfortable, it was so familiar. It seemed she had always been a helpless spectator at her own life story, powerless to effect change.

  She hadn’t been able to stop her father’s remarriage; she hadn’t been able to stop her stepsisters from claiming the room that had been hers all her life—’They like your corner room so much, honey. You don’t mind, do you?’—and she hadn’t even been able to resist the forceful suggestion that she leave her own home, after her father died. She’d always been the expendable pawn in someone else’s game; always been pushed aside by the irresistible force of someone else’s wants and needs…

  But you always went willingly, didn’t you?

  The thought was a shout inside her head, making her face go still.

  What if, just once, you’d said no? No, I won’t give up my room, No, I won’t leave my father’s house…What if just one time, Rebecca, you’d refused to go quietly?

  She stared at nothing, transfixed by the totally alien concept of simply refusing to be powerless. What if, indeed?

  ‘No,’ she whispered tentatively.

  ‘What?’ Marcus asked.

  Very carefully, very slowly, she placed the spoon back in the salad bowl and turned to face him. ‘No,’ she said more strongly, into his chest. And then, as if the word itself imparted courag
e, she looked up and met his empty gray eyes. ‘I’m not leaving.’

  Her gaze was steady and her voice was clear, but she felt like a stubborn child throwing a tantrum, and her heart trembled in fearful anticipation of consequences she couldn’t imagine.

  His gaze sharpened instantly. ‘You’re not leaving—what is that supposed to mean? Do you intend to stay here forever?’

  Rebecca hesitated, her determination faltering at the sarcastic chill in his tone. ‘No…just…for as long as it takes to prove…’ She stumbled in her search for the right words.

  Although he remained motionless, Marcus’s eyes flickered with impatience, a thin blanket covering the suspicion that smoldered there. ‘Well? What is it you intend to prove?’ he demanded harshly, and before her fumbling thoughts could form an answer the suspicion in his eyes hardened into a stare of grim certainty. ‘That I really am capable of the kind of acts Charity described?’ he goaded her, his tone frigid. ‘Is that what you’re waiting for? Final confirmation of my despicable character, so you can write your screenplay assassination with a clear conscience?’

  Rebecca was shaking her head frantically in a mute protest, but he didn’t seem to notice.

  ‘Well, let me save us both some time,’ he snarled, stepping forward and grabbing her shoulders hard enough to make her gasp. ‘Is this the Marcus Flint you want to prove exists? Is this the kind of man who makes good box office?’ His fingers pressed deeply into her flesh and his eyes narrowed to bright slits, like sun coming through a venetian blind. With another step he trapped her against the counter, then jerked her hard against the length of his body. Rebecca felt the air leave her lungs in a rush.

  ‘The kind of man who takes what he wants and the consequences be damned; that’s the Marcus Flint you want to believe in, isn’t it?’

  Blue eyes widened as much by dismay as they were by shock, Rebecca tried to shake her head, but his hands were free now with his body pinning her against the counter, and they grasped her head and held it rigid. His breath broke in hot gusts over her face.